Getting close to publishing my latest novel, “The Orphan Girl.” I’m excited! The story has some complex plot lines, but I bring it all together in the end. Not without a lot of action by Dan and his Delta Force buddies along the way, doing what they do best, wreak havoc on the bad guys.
The manuscript is out to my Beta Readers for review. As with my other novels, I’m putting it up for pre-release ordering on Amazon. The price will be $1.99 for the ebook for the first ten days, so you can get in on the early savings.
Here’s a sample of the first chapter.
The two men sat in their car. It was parked under some curbside trees in a dark area of the street. They were in the Ojo de Agua neighborhood of Mexico City. Instead of attached houses, elaborate or otherwise, found closer in, the homes here were separated, having gates with walls or fences around the compact yards. After arriving in the late afternoon, they waited throughout the evening. Now, with darkness upon them, they relaxed some. There was less chance of them attracting unwanted attention. While they waited, they did not talk much. It was not part of the work they did.
After some hours of silence, interrupted only a few times with short comments about things going on in the street, the passenger asked, “You think he’s home?”
The driver considered the question for a moment before answering. “Either home or on a trip. If a man is in his home town, he eats, sleeps, and makes love in his home. We didn’t see him leave. He’s there.”
The driver was not one to say much, so his partner considered this a long speech.
Dusk deepened over the city, darkening the already shady street. In a few more hours, there would be little light to relieve the blackness, the time when these men acted. They continued to sit patiently, waiting. The walls surrounding the house were no impediment. They were used to getting through such primitive obstacles.
After a long silence, the passenger spoke again.
“I hope the wife and daughter are home. It makes it easier.”
“Es su hija y su nieta,” it is his daughter and granddaughter. The driver liked to be precise and often had to correct his partner’s sloppy thinking.
Before midnight, the neighborhood had settled down for the evening. People here left for work early, so they did not stay up late. At 12:30, the driver nudged his partner, who had dozed off.
“Vamos ahora,” we go now.
The two men quietly opened their doors. No inside lights came on. They were disabled so as to not give anything away. After gently closing the doors, the men walked over to the wall. The gate would be monitored with a security camera. The tops of the walls were protected with broken glass embedded into the concrete cap. The men brought a thick mat to lay over the glass so they could scramble over the top.
There was a dog on the premises; they could hear it nosing around, sensing something or someone on the other side of the wall. They had prepared for that. The passenger tossed a pound of ground beef over the wall. It was laced with a barbiturate that would put the dog to sleep for hours, if not kill him outright.
Startled, the dog growled in response to the surprise offering. Soon, though, they could hear him eagerly eating the snack. The driver looked at his watch. They would give the dog fifteen minutes, then they would go over the wall. The dog would be unconscious by then.
The mat was tossed on top, and the two men clambered over the wall and dropped to the grass. At their feet lay the large mastiff, out cold and breathing shallowly. They left the mat on the wall and headed for the house.
The front door was locked. A set of glass doors led into a family room from the patio on the side of the house. With his gloves on, the driver punched the pane near the door handle. It broke with what seemed a loud sound in the quiet of the night as glass fell to the floor. The driver reached in and turned the handle, opening the door.
The two men went through the house to the stairs. They quietly climbed to the second floor. At the top, they turned to the left towards the master bedroom at the end of the hall.
I hope you’ll join my other readers on Dan latest adventures.
